


Intimacy

by AnotherLoser



Category: DC's Legends of Tomorrow (TV)
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Chronos aftermath, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-19
Updated: 2017-04-23
Packaged: 2018-10-20 19:25:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,954
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10669221
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnotherLoser/pseuds/AnotherLoser
Summary: Shoutout to Jen who wrote this all with me.





	1. Chapter 1

He wouldn’t have blamed Leonard if he never forgave Mick.  The biggest problem between the pair has been trust; Mick’s memories still had to be sorted out some, some of his behaviors and instincts were different too, and he had not only threatened Leonard but he did so by stating he’d kill Lisa. Repeatedly. Brainwashed, sure, they both knew that but that doesn’t mean it’s easy for Leonard to not hear the words his partner had said or see the look in his eyes again. Mick understood, just as Leonard did, that it would take work on both of their parts to be okay again.

He knows what he remembers isn’t true now, he’s gotten that far.  Mick mostly just tries to block out as much as possible, not think about the past.  It’s the best he can figure out to do.  That, and how quiet he’s been.  Less comments, less conversation, but he’s trying.  When either of of them needed space they got it, and otherwise Mick was just trying to go about things like normal.

It’s been working for the most part. On his side, anyway.  He doesn’t know what was going on in Leonard’s head, but clearly he was giving Mick a shot so Mick is trying his best to not waste that.  
He really thought he was okay with this if Leonard was.  He did.

 

It’s the first time they’ve tried being intimate since Mick got back. 

Expectations aren’t too high for how far this was going to go. Mick honestly expected Leonard to be the one to call it off though. He’s been cautious, and Leonard apparently even had to take the reigns, rolled them over on the bed. It was fine - great, actually - until it suddenly wasn’t. It’s the weight on his chest, hands on him, something about it sets him off and it’s _PANIC_. He squirms and shouts before Leonard can even react.

“Get off me! GET OFF!” He nearly knocked Leonard on his ass in shoving him off. It doesn’t register yet, he’s busy trying to focus on the present, on reality instead of whatever it was just replaced with. He’s pretty sure neither of them saw that coming.

Now he’s sat there blinking through his confusion with his heart pounding in chest- minutes passing this way with his eyes on the wall across from him and when he finally looks at Leonard he sees him sat on the edge of the bed hugging himself.  "Do you need me to leave?"  He asks, and Mick is conflicted.

The fear suddenly stirred up was less about Leonard and more about restraints and bloodshed, but when he looks at him it tries to twist into worse; into the idea that Leonard was going to hurt him, _has_  hurt him.  But he knows that isn’t true.  Knows that Leonard is closing himself off like that for a reason, and it has nothing to do with manipulation or tricks.  Leonard knows what Mick was taught to think of him.  He had said it flat out one time and he’s regretted it since.

“No.”  He murmurs, breathing deep and shaking his head.  “No, I just…”  a pause to clear his throat.  “You okay?”  He asks, because it’s fading.  The discomfort under his skin was going away, he just needed to breathe.

It doesn’t really matter if he does or doesn't, he briefly thinks, because he finds Leonard emotionally getting further and further away from Mick. His cold walls building themselves high- not higher than ever before but slowly. Mick doesn’t talk much nowadays but Leonard was trying to be the shoulder his partner needs to lean on. That’s really all there was to be offered, and he was all that felt familiar anymore.  Mick appreciated every minute of his time Leonard was willing to give, even if it might not seem like it.  He is distinctly aware of how Leonard is pulling in on himself, the contrast between it and his typical behavior as of late.  His body portrays from head to toe his distance, emotional and physical.

Mick doesn't make a move to bridge that gap.  Not yet.  Maybe not tonight at all.  Just because his memories had been altered into a darker light didn't mean that he didn't remember the little things about his partner; the tells and signs he portrayed.  His hunched shoulders told him not to touch or get too close.  His refusal to turn around and look at Mick again told him he was emotional and didn't want to be.

There were emotions in Mick's eyes as well that he would see if he looked.  That fleeting moment of realization that he thought Len was there to put hurt onto him. Snart isn’t going to risk it. He’s silent for a long while as he just stares in the open space in front of himself.  Snart tilts his head to the side as he nudges his neck against his shoulder in that way he always does when he’s vulnerable as he is. Then he finally answers. “Yeah..”

Mick purses his lips.  He doubts that was true but isn’t sure how to call him out on it without starting something.  That’s how it goes a lot lately.  No comments or thoughts he has will be received well by anyone these days, and so he doesn’t say much at all.  He hasn’t warmed up to any of them either since his return, so at least it was fair.  With Leonard it was different though.  He’s the only one Mick really talked to even when they first started on this journey. It always was just the two of them. Looking out for each other, calming each other down when they needed it- though it was mostly just the pyromaniac that needed to simmer down but point stands.

Mick had only ever been on _his_  team. It’s always been that way, but they’re miles apart as much as they were still in sync with one another. He doesn’t know how easy it will be to push the other’s button now, but he suspects it’s easier than it was before all of this happened.  So while he is more talkative with Leonard, is usually by his side unless one of them seems to not want that, Mick is still cautious.  The balance they have right now looks fragile from his perspective.

In this moment right here though, sat apart but not as far as it feels, he just wished it was better.  That they were better.  That he was.  He thought progress had been made.  Not leap and bounds but enough that he shouldn’t be having flashbacks while making out with his partner.  He doesn’t know how to say anything right anymore.  Probably didn’t before either but Leonard knew how to figure out what he was trying to say when his words didn’t make it clear.  Now he isn't sure if his partner will do the same or take it too literally to figure it out.

Eventually though, Mick comes up with saying,  "’s not your fault, y'know.”   _Not what they did, not this now, none of it._  He doesn’t say.  He feels like he should.  He’s no better at expressing feelings than he used to be though.  But he needs..Something.

 

Leonard’s head jerks. Not turning to face him just yet. Though he could see him in the corner of his eye. Averting his gaze, Snart says in a softer tone than before, “Don’t start.” and shakes his head.

“Not starting anything. Just…I didn’t freak out because of you. Thought you should know.” He trails off, moving to sit on the edge of the bed with his feet on the floor. There he leans forward with his elbows on his knees and shakes his head as well. Falling silent again.

They were fucked.

Mick feels as if he’s just taken five steps backwards after one or two forward.  Kind of feels like he should have seen this coming.  Just because some things were better shouldn’t have made him think he was going to get anywhere.  Never mind anywhere with Leonard; Mick can’t tell if the younger is afraid of hurting him or afraid of being hurt.  Maybe both for all he knows but either way he doesn’t know how to fix it.

He runs a hand over his head and rubs the back of his neck.  He wants to ask why Leonard was even here, why he was even putting up with all of this when he doesn’t trust Mick anymore.  It isn’t that Mick can blame him for that, he just wished his partner was here because of something more than guilt.  He’s silent instead.  Always silent these days. Always careful.  He has to be.  He nearly knocked Raymond on his ass when the guy tried to wake him from a nap.  He’s unstable.  Can’t imagine hurting Leonard, but he’d have to really be an idiot to think they didn’t both know that there was a possibility.

Maybe Leonard is the dumb one if he’s willing to go against his defensive instinct for Mick.  To think most people wouldn't even bother sticking around at all when someone had to repair themselves, never mind someone with Leonard's history faced with the mess that Mick was now.  Too tedious to bother.

 

At his words Leonard takes the chance to turn and look in Mick’s general direction. Sorrowful eyes watching the other's back as he tries to say something but it gets caught in his throat and so he breathes through his nose in discontent. Lips tightly closed. But then the gears are turning in his head.  “We both know that’s a lie.” Snart shot at Mick as he stared down his partner's back.

The moment he laid on him was the moment something switched on in his head.  He can see how it looks.  He gets it.  But that’s not how it was.  He _debates_ saying so- not because Leonard shouldn’t know, because he didn’t want to reassure him.  The problem is that he doesn’t want to talk about it.  It wasn’t Leonard’s fault, and it also wasn’t about him specifically.

Silence settles.

He can see it on his face, in his eyes, the negative route his thoughts were running down.  Chronos had not been so attuned to another's emotions but he was even more observant than Mick natural was on his own.

More goddamn silence.

 

“Wasn’t you.  Was your weigh on me.  The worst was done strapped down to a chair.  Wrists, ankles, chest.  I didn’t even know it’d set me off, so it ain’t your fault.”  He explains.  He himself can’t tell if he sounds more defeated or reluctant.  

This is really more thinking than Mick likes to do.  It was sort of a joke that he didn’t think much, but in a sense it was true.  He wasn’t some idiot void of thought, he just didn’t overthink much.  If there was no helping it, if there was no reason for him to be concerned, if it even didn’t interest him, then he dismissed it.  He’s had a lot of time to think lately though.  He tries not to, but sometimes he’s needed to think through and process and work out things.  Right now is not one of those times, he didn’t need to have gone through as much as he has, it was stupid.  He was just working himself into a hole at this point.

Finally Mick turns to look over his shoulder at Leonard again.  It’s been so long since he had something good.  Just little things here and there since his return, including those few memories that he’s fixed.  It was something, but nothing compared to the lifetimes he spent brainwashed. Angry. Cold.  The time before that suffering …  He wants something good again.  
He parts his lips, ready to speak, ready to ask an honest question, but it dies in his throat.  He closes his mouth.  There’s not much point.  He’s fucked.  His head hurts.  It hurts a lot these days when he’s been thinking on things like this.  The booze helps.

“So .. What. I shouldn’t touch you?”  He doesn’t want that. He wants to hold and be held and feel Leonard’s skin, scars and all, under his hands. What he doesn’t want is to lash out. Doesn’t want to be afraid again, certainly not of Leonard. Mick was hardly ever a fearful person. When he was young he feared himself, what kind of person he was to do the things he did. Over time though he grew to accept it. Even then there wasn’t much fear for what others could do to him, and even if there was he’d urge them on to get it over with without revealing a thing other than that he was batshit crazy. It only even got worse as he got older, grinning during brawls and laughing when guns are pulled, except it stopped being an act too. Mick was hardly afraid of one damn thing. Only person who could ever get to him was Leonard.

The Time Masters are dead when he gets the chance. They’ve turned him into a damn victim, made him afraid of himself again. Apparently too damaged to be touched by his own partner. Can’t sleep hardly, can’t trust his own head sometimes. That might be worse than the treatment he’d undergone, as far as Mick was concerned.

 

The dip in the mattress as Leonard moves closer pulls him from his head.  His partner slips into his space, with one leg folded and the other straightening across the bed behind Mick. He fit himself into his frame. Drove his point home as he softly touched his partner’s forearm giving it a light squeeze and imploring eyes searching his Mick’s own.It feels new again.  So many years without a kind touch..  It is new again.  He remembers intimacy with Leonard, but it’s been so long.  Distant like everything else from his old life no matter how clearly he remembers.

He urges him, “What do you want to do, Mick?” asks in a softer, more intimate tone, “What do you _need_?” He was usually good at giving his partner what he needed, even if it was destructive. In the past, it was getting them out of dangerous situations or giving his partner in crime opportunities where he could light things up on fire. Knowing how well Leonard has always handled him in the past, Mick thinks he has a plan here.  Likely figured something out that he hadn't yet himself.

He’s not sure what gets to him more, the touch or the words and how Leonard says them.

“I don’t know..”  He says simply, honest.  He’s wondered before if Leonard realized just how clueless he was or not, if he thought that Mick knew what he was doing, what was going on.  Maybe, maybe not.  “But this isn’t bad.”  It’s comfortable, actually.  More so than he expected.  He probably should have seen it coming; being around Leonard made him feel better.  Not normal, but better.  Despite their current problems, Leonard is what he knows.  He needed him just as much as he wanted him.  So maybe, without really thinking about it, it’s natural for Mick to lean into his partner.

Leonard begins to say as he strokes his palm over the length of Mick’s arm, “Well. Once you figure it out, you’ll let me know, yes?”  That’s when he looks up kindly at the other and reaches with his free hand, lightly cupping the nape of his partner’s neck. Drawing the other close and pressing their foreheads together in this tender moment.

 

This isn’t where he thought the night would go.  He hadn't expected sex, he thought maybe they’d get heated but he knew one of them would have to pull away.  He didn’t really expect it to be himself, definitely didn’t see a flashback or panic coming.  One more curve ball is this; comfort delivered in soft touches and kind words, nothing more than a hand on his arm and his partner’s body heat close beside him.

In another setting he’d be irritated.  He doesn’t want to be a victim.  Never has for one day in his life.  The bad things that had happened to him were most all his own fault and what wasn’t simply _were_ as far as Mick was concerned, he’d never _been_  a _victim_ of anything.  Now though-- He still doesn’t want it, he’d probably pull away in seconds if he were handled so delicately in any other setting.  But it reaches something in him, and for the moment it feels like what he needs.  Wether or not this will happen again is unknown, just like wether or not he’ll have another panic like minutes ago.  With that thought, he doesn’t mind in the slightest.

 

A soft sigh escapes him, brows furrowed slightly.  "Yeah.“  He answers.  His head still hurts.  Just a dull throb, but it’s there.  He wonders if he’s fighting something in his head like this.  He also wonders if he could just sleep like this- but, no, he can’t.  For one thing that would require moving and he doesn’t feel like it just yet, and for another, too deep of sleep may result in another dream and another time he slips out of bed and they both pretend not to notice, reminding him how little progress he’s made.

What he can do though..  Mick raises a hand to do the same as Leonard, cupping his neck.  Maybe it’s confirmation, maybe just wanting to feel like he has a hold on him.  Either way, he figures.

“Good.”


	2. Chapter 2

Len's pov can be found here: http://archiveofourown.org/works/10709955

**Author's Note:**

> Shoutout to Jen who wrote this all with me.


End file.
